“I wish he’d thrown Ed McPhee off along with them, but Mike’s always played fair, and I can’t really argue with him. Slippery Ed’s probably not as dangerous as he was ten years ago, although I wouldn’t trust him to hold my coat if I was saving his drowning sister.”
“Perhaps he’ll elect to travel with them, since he said he needed them for business.”
“Don’t get your hopes up, Wentworth. McPhee obviously wants to be on this boat—as Mike pointed out, he could get to New Orleans a lot faster by train, and cheaper, too. No, he’s got some monkey business planned, and I’m more and more afraid it has to do with my treasure hunt. We’ll have to keep a sharp eye on him, Wentworth—never mind the alligators. Come on, let’s take a look at the rest of the boat. We’ll pay another visit here when there’s a pilot on board.”
We spent the next hour visiting various parts of the boat and meeting the crew members in charge of them. Not only did all these people seem to recognize Mr. Clemens, but they greeted him with enormous respect, almost as a hero returning to his home country.
Our first stop after the pilothouse was the engine room, on the main deck; the boilers sat cold, and the well-muscled stokers were amusing themselves with a hand of cards, but they stopped to greet their famous guest when we came through the door. The engineer was a sturdy-looking fellow who introduced himself as Antoine Devereaux—“Frenchy, they call me,” he said with an accent that bore no trace of the Parisian. Later I learned that he was a Creole from Louisiana.
M. Devereaux was busily inspecting his engines one last time before departure, but he stopped to shake hands with Mr. Clemens. “The captain says fix ever’thing up first-class—spend anything I need to. I guess I got you partly to thank for these new boilers.”
“Not me, but Henry Rogers in New York. How do they look?”
“Oh, they don’t look like much, but they work just fine. We had ’er out for a test Saturday, and she run sweet as candy. Ain’t gonna be a racer, but she never was to begin with.”
“Do you remember the old days when they fired the boilers with cordwood?” asked Mr. Clemens.
“Sure do,” said the engineer. “Wouldn’t go back to ’em if you paid me double. It was tougher on the boilers, and on the boys, too—crew could get mighty tired of takin’ on wood if you do it five, maybe six times between St. Louis and St. Paul. Some of the boys, they complain all the time about how dirty the coal is. If they gotta stack cordwood a couple times, they don’t worry about the dirt no more, I guarantee you.”
On the foredeck, another gang of powerfully built men were wrestling boxes of provisions on board and stowing them for the journey, urged on by a veritable giant of a man: the first mate, Mr. Clemens told me. This individual was apparently of the opinion that no simple order would suffice to convey his wishes; instead he peppered his sentences with such a profusion of oaths, threats, and profanity that I involuntarily glanced aloft to make certain that thunderclouds were not gathering to strike him down.
“Git it up there, ye mud-nosed tadpole. GIT it up there, damn ye! Don’t you know how to grab the **** thing, ye **** son of a ******? Get a grip on it—if ye drop the damned thing, I’ll fry yer arse and throw it overboard! NO! You **** ****** ** *** **** bastard! Put yer back into it! Hump it! Jesus H. Christ! HUMP it!” All this was roared out in a voice that threatened to shatter windows miles away.
Then his eye lit on us, and I cringed involuntarily. But his whole manner changed as he introduced himself. “Welcome aboard the Horace, Mr. Sam. I’m Bob Williams—they calls me Tiny,” he said in a voice as mild as a Methodist deacon’s, all the while peering down at me from what must have been six and a half feet of height. Mr. Clemens introduced me, and the mate’s huge right hand swallowed mine in an iron grasp. “Anybody cause Mr. Sam any trouble, you call for Tiny. They ain’t gonna cause nobody trouble after I gets done with ’em.” He grinned broadly. I decided on the spot to do my best to stay on Mr. Williams’s good side, and smiled back at him, doing my best not to inspect my hand for damage.
We walked along the deck and stuck our heads into the clerk’s office, where Mr. Snipes looked up from a desk, scowling for a moment until he recognized us. Behind him, a pimply youngster transcribed something from loose papers into a thick ledger. I recognized him as Tommy, the boy who’d shown me to my cabin earlier. “Don’t mind us,” said Mr. Clemens. “I’m just showing Cabot how the boat’s laid out.”
“Oh, Mr. Sam—I’ve been looking forward to having you on board,” said Snipes. “You probably don’t remember, but I was a mud clerk on the boat you took downriver back in ’82, the Gold Dust. Just a boy then, but I got away from work enough to hear you tell some of your stories.”
“Well, glad to hear it. And thanks again for fishing Cabot out this morning.”
“Think nothing of it, Mr. Sam. I’d’ve done it for anybody. Just hope my work will let me see more of you this time.”
“Well, I expect you’ll get the chance. Did you get that little matter of the Throckmortons settled?”
“Not as well as I’d have liked—McPhee’s still with us. I’ll keep a sharp eye on him, though—if he tries any of his rascally tricks on the Horace, I’ll take it to the captain again. We stand to make a lot of money this trip, and I don’t want him cutting into it.”
“Much appreciated,” said Mr. Clemens. “We know you’ll do what you can.”
“Thanks again for pulling me out of the drink,” I said. “You look familiar; where have I seen you before?”
“I saw you at Mr. Sam’s lecture in New York, when you come for an interview,” said Snipes. “Me and the captain were there for a week of meetings with Mr. Twain and Mr. Rogers.”
“Yes, exactly—I should have remembered that,” I said.
“I never forget a face,” said Snipes. “Comes in handy in this line of work.”
From Snipes’s office, we turned up the stairway (which Mr. Clemens insisted on calling a ladder) into the grand saloon which took up half the second deck of the Horace Greeley, the other half being devoted to a lecture hall for Mr. Clemens’s talks. This large room served as a lounge and dining room, with a well-furnished bar along one side and comfortable seats along the walls. Small tables occupied the center of the lounge, and a number of the passengers who had already boarded were sitting at them, sipping coffee, tea, or other drinks and chatting among themselves. As Mr. Clemens entered the room, an expectant hush fell.
“Don’t mind me,” he said, smiling and waving his hand. “If you all stop talking every time I stick my head out of my cabin, you’re likely to turn me into a human turtle. We’re going to be shipmates for the next few weeks, and we might as well get used to one another.”
At that, a group of passengers pressed forward to introduce themselves to Mr. Clemens. I was surprised to notice among them the tall blonde woman I had noticed at his lecture in Chicago; she introduced herself to him as Laura Cunningham, of Boston. She noticed me at Mr. Clemens’s side, and before I could quite gather my wits, she was extending her hand to me and introducing herself. I told her my name, and she smiled. “A Cabot on the Mississippi!” she said. “What, pray tell, are you doing out here, a thousand miles from home? You should be in Boston, acting dull and respectable.”
“I’m afraid my branch of the family left Boston long ago,” I said. “I’m from Connecticut.” At close range, I could see that she was older than I had thought—possibly thirty.
She looked me up and down, a mischievous smile on her face. “Ah, and are your family the black sheep among the Cabots? I never heard of such a thing!”
“Oh, I don’t think so,” I said. “My father is an attorney in New London, and about as dull and respectable as the Boston branch of the family. I suppose that if traveling with Mr. Clemens as his secretary is being a black sheep, I’m the closest you’ll find to that.”
She gave a pleasant little laugh, and said, “Then you’ll have to be on your best behavior, Mr. Cabot. I know quite a few of your mo
st respectable relatives, and I would be remiss not to report any lapses on your part. I must confess, though, it is a pleasant surprise to find someone with connections to society out here. We will have to speak more.” We shook hands again, and I turned to see how Mr. Clemens was faring with the other passengers.
These were a decidedly mixed lot. In a few short minutes, he greeted a pasty-faced clergyman from Boston, Mr. Dutton, traveling with his plump wife and two simpering daughters, Gertrude and Berenice, both of whom cast a speculative eye on me; an overly bejeweled matron from Baltimore with a voice like an army bugle, who introduced herself as the sister of one of his old friends, and an unctuous Chicagoan who tried to tell Mr. Clemens about some gadget he’d invented. Each of them appeared eager to draw Mr. Clemens into an extended conversation, but he simply nodded, offered a few superficialities, and moved on to others in the crowd.
He kept his patience rather well, I thought, especially when a pimply young man with round spectacles and a rumpled suit grasped his hand. “I’m so looking forward to this journey, Mr. Clemens,” he said, smiling broadly. “Claude Dexter, of Boston. Ever since I read your Life on the Mississippi, I’ve made a study of the river and dreamed of taking a riverboat cruise. To do so in your company is a special pleasure. It’s a pity the boat couldn’t have been somewhat more authentic—a side-wheeler would’ve been much more exciting.”
“I’m afraid the Greeley is about as authentic as we could afford,” said Mr. Clemens. “I suppose we could’ve done without some of the modern inconveniences.” Several of the listeners laughed. “But I’m not quite ready to give up all the comforts just for the sake of nostalgia—and turning her into a side-wheeler would be a real stretch. I’m just glad to be back on the river. If you enjoy the trip half as much as I intend to, it’ll be well worth your fare.”
“Oh, I expect it will be,” said Dexter, beaming. “Still, don’t you think electric lights are so much less romantic than oil lamps?”
“Yes, and so much less inclined to start authentic fires,” said Mr. Clemens. He nodded and turned toward the bar; as I turned to follow him, I noticed Major Demayne standing there, looking at me and my employer.
“Hello again, Mr. Cabot,” the Major said. “I hope you’ve taken no ill effects from your dunking?”
“No sir, thank you. And I don’t think I’ve thanked you properly for driving away those two bullies; I might have come off much worse had they been waiting for me when I climbed out.”
“Aha, I’d heard someone gave those skunks a proper thrashing,” said Mr. Clemens. “I guess I ought to thank you as well—secretaries aren’t as easy to come to as you’d think these days. Cabot’s a bit green, but I think he’ll season up pretty well. Can I buy you a drink, Mr. . . . ?”
“Major Roy Demayne, at your service, sir. I confess to being one of your admirers, and a bit of an amateur scribbler, as you might say.”
“I won’t let that stop me from buying you a drink,” said my employer. “What’ll it be? I’m having whisky and soda.”
“That would be a most welcome libation, sir. I must say, I’ve been looking forward to meeting you.”
“I hope it’s not a disappointment, Major. I’ve only the usual number of heads, and I rarely levitate in public. You can probably find half a dozen more interesting characters up any back alley in town.”
The Major laughed. “You have already lived up to my expectations, sir. I have read many of your books, sir, and hope eventually to emulate you in your chosen career, if not precisely in the same genre.”
The drinks came, and Mr. Clemens lifted his glass to Major Demayne. “Again my thanks,” he said, and I added my sincere appreciation as we all three touched glasses. Mr. Clemens took a sip of his, and then continued. “Writing isn’t all that complicated, if you get right down to it. A man has to go into a room with a pile of blank paper and cover it with words—that’s the easy part. Any simpleton who’s learned his ABCs can do that much. The part nobody can teach you is how to make somebody give you money for the paper once you’ve got it covered.”
“Surely inspiration counts for something,” the Major said. “Perhaps everyone has the capacity to tell a simple tale, but the true artist brings something to his subject, some ethereal spark caught from the muse.”
“How true,” said another passenger—the minister, whose wife and daughters seemed to have left him behind. He looked somewhat askance at the glasses in our hands, but made no overt criticism.
“I’ve caught more sparks from a cigar than from any muse,” said Mr. Clemens, ignoring the minister. “My success comes mostly from hard work, and keeping my eyes and ears open—and a touch of luck. There are men out on the river who can tell as good a story as anything I’ve ever put on paper. Any stage driver or hotel clerk could probably tell you a hundred such. The difference between them and a successful author is mostly the willingness to spend seven or eight hours a day putting the stories down and making them work on paper. I don’t claim it’s easy, but that’s all there really is to it.”
“Perhaps I can persuade you to examine some of my own poor efforts,” said the Major, reaching into his breast pocket.
A look of panic came over Mr. Clemens’s face. “You aren’t the poet, are you?”
“Only a poor scribbler,” said the Major, extracting a thick sheaf of paper from his pocket. “Would it be more convenient for you to glance over these efforts of mine on your own or for us to meet so I can read selections to you? Verse gains so much when spoken aloud. . . .”
“Verse isn’t really my strong suit,” said Mr. Clemens, peering around as if to locate an emergency exit. “Now, Cabot here might know something about it—he went to Yale. You’ll be glad to read the Major’s poems, won’t you, Cabot?” He fixed me with a stare that left no doubt as to the answer he expected.
“I suppose I could look at it,” I began, not certain what I might be committing myself to, but the Major pressed his manuscript into my hand before I could continue. I stared at it, then back at the Major, who had paused, as if in thought. Then a new expression crossed his face.
“I hope you’ll read this carefully, and pass along anything of particular interest to Mr. Clemens,” he said, more quickly than before. “But I fear I’ve taken up too much of your time, gentlemen. Thanks again for your hospitality, sir.” He bowed and made his departure, leaving his whisky half-finished on the bar.
“That’s about as fast as I ever got rid of a writer who was trying to sell me something,” said Mr. Clemens, looking quite relieved. “Most of them are as persistent as chiggers. I suppose he thinks he’s paying for my advice, and wants to get his money’s worth early, and I suppose he’s right, when you get right down to it. Try to read some of it, Wentworth, and tell me if it’s worth my time. They do teach you about poetry at Yale, don’t they?”
“Not a great deal, sir—” I began, but Mr. Clemens interrupted, a gleam in his eye.
“Are you going to tell me you wouldn’t know doggerel if it bit you?”
I was about to reply when a familiar voice from behind me called my name. I turned to see Detective Berrigan, who grinned and said, “I heard about your taking the waters earlier today.”
“Not for my health, I assure you,” I responded. I began to fear that everyone aboard would know of my dunking, and comment on it endlessly until some other subject for gossip arose.
“Well, I hear the good news of it is that we won’t have those two bully boys to worry about. I can’t say it pains me to see them go, although professionally I ought to want them where I can keep an eye on them.”
“You don’t think they had anything to do with that business back in New York, do you?” asked Mr. Clemens.
Before Berrigan could answer, a strident voice called out from across the deck. “Well, Paul Berrigan—what in the devil’s name brings you out west?”
“God give me patience,” said Berrigan, grimacing. “If that’s who I think it is, I’ll wire for a transfer back home
this instant.” We turned to see a lean, lantern-jawed fellow in a loud checked suit striding over to us.
“Mark Twain,” the newcomer said. “I’m Andrew Dunbar, with the New York Herald. How does it happen that you know Detective Berrigan?”
I thought I heard Mr. Clemens mutter something sulfurous under his breath, but by then the reporter had out a notebook and was firing questions at a distance of about eight inches from Mr. Clemens’s face.
“Is it true you’ve gone bankrupt, Mark? Is that why the police are following you?” He held his pencil pointed toward Mr. Clemens’s face, swaying back on his heels and then forward in a most disconcerting manner.
“None of your damned business,” growled Mr. Clemens.
“If you won’t tell me your side of the story, I’ll have to print the rumors, Mark. Do you deny that you’re in trouble with the law?” The reporter turned abruptly and faced Berrigan. “Is he involved in a homicide case?”
“Any more of your damned impertinence and I will be involved in a homicide case,” said Mr. Clemens.
“No you won’t,” said Detective Berrigan from between clenched teeth. “Exterminating vermin isn’t homicide. What in the blazes are you doing on this boat, Dunbar?”
“The Herald sent me to cover Mark’s lecture tour,” said the reporter, not showing the least cognizance of the hostility with which my employer and the detective had greeted him. “He’s a public figure, and the public has a right to know what he’s up to. Word has it he’s flat broke and he’s sold his house, his publishing company, everything.”
“How sad, if true,” said the minister, still lingering on the fringes of the little group around my employer.
“Maybe it’s true, and maybe it’s not,” said Mr. Clemens to the reporter. “But you’re not going to find out from Berrigan. And the only thing you’re going to hear from me from now on is what I have to say in my lectures. They’re included in the price of the tour, so I can’t very well keep you out. But I’ll warn you—print one word of them, and I’ll shut you down for copyright violation.”
[Mark Twain Mysteries 01] - Death on the Mississippi Page 10